What a morning concert that was! It is true it lasted only a few
minutes, but it seemed to be a medley of all the beautiful songs ever
sung by birds. Surely Dick gave them his entire repertoire. His little
quivering throat seemed to be an instrument on which he played the long,
cool, clear notes of the wood thrush, the sweet trills of the canary
bird, arpeggios and runs, turns, quavers and semi-quavers. Edward threw
himself on the ground in a transport of enjoyment as he watched the
throbbing little creature.
Then, with a final chirp, Dick hopped down on the door sill, looked in
with an inquiring twist of his head, and flew away as quickly as he had
come.
"Was there ever anything to equal that?" cried Billie, breaking the
silence which had settled upon them during the concert.
"The darling little fellow," exclaimed Elinor. "Anybody would suppose he
had come to make a morning call on a sick friend and give him a concert
to cheer him up."
"Virginia's house must be near here, because she told me herself Dick
never went far from home," Mary observed.
"There's no telling," answered Billie. "I've lost all sense of direction
in this place; but I think we'd better get to work," she answered,
glancing at her blue enamel watch. "It's eleven o'clock. Edward, do you
think we could knock some of the planks off the lower part of the house
without doing much damage?"
Edward, who had been lying flat on his back in a day dream, pulled
himself together and jumped up quickly.
"Of course," he said apologetically, "if we can find anything to do it
with."
"Perhaps, if the hermit built his own house, he has a few tools," said
Mary. "Let's look in and see, at any rate."
Sure enough, they did find an old rusty hatchet standing in one corner
of the room. The house had been built on a slight foundation consisting
of four pine stumps about a foot high and the space from the floor to
the ground level was covered with planking. It was these boards Billie's
quick thought had designed to remove.
Warming to the work, Edward hammered vigorously, but it was very
difficult to release the thick boards which had been secured with long
nails. Edward's slim, piano-playing hands seemed hardly strong enough
for the task and after the top nails had been loosened, the four girls,
sitting in a row beside him, each took hold and began to pull. The rusty
nails clung to the wood with irritating obstinacy and then after all
gave way unexpectedly, as obstinate things and people are apt to do.
Over they went on their backs in a laughing, giggling confusion of
skirts and feet, with the plank on top of them.
They sat up rubbing the dust from their eyes.
Then with wild shrieks they jumped to their feet and fled in every
direction, Edward with them. There curled up under the house, his head
raised, ready to strike, was a long gray and green snake.
"Oh, dear, oh dear!" cried Elinor, while Edward shivered with disgust,
and the other girls pressed together with feelings of terror. How were
they not to know that hideous reptiles and beasts were not around them
everywhere in this wild place?
But the snake, evidently much relieved that matters were no worse,
glided off in the bushes.
"I hope his wife isn't around," groaned Nancy. "They always have a wife
about somewhere."
"I don't see her," said Edward, coming resolutely forth and seizing the
hatchet. "Shall we get this next board off and finish the thing as soon
as possible? This is a deucedly wild place to be in without any weapon
but a rusty hatchet."
With feelings of more or less repugnance they finally loosened the
second board. Placing one on top of the other, so that all five of the
party could lend a hand in carrying them back to the motor, they started
down the path.
"What's that?" exclaimed Mary, looking back.
"What's what?" they demanded in a chorus, almost dropping the boards in
their nervousness.
"Under the house."
"Not another snake?" shrieked Elinor.
"No, no; it's a box, I think."
"Let's leave it," said Elinor. "It's none of our concern. Probably love
letters of the hermit."
But, strange to say, as if a will stronger than his own impelled him,
Edward shifted his end of the board to one of the others and walked back
to the house.
"It is a box," he called, moving the object with his foot. "Shall I
bring it along?"
The girls laid the boards on the ground to consider. Elinor had worked
up a romantic tale in her head about the box which she now imparted to
her friends.
"The hermit who lived here," she said, "was probably disappointed in
love. He built a house in the woods and put his love letters in the
corner stone----"
"Which was a cedar post--" interrupted Nancy.
"And when he died," went on Elinor.
"But how do you know he is dead?" they demanded.
"If he were not dead, he'd be living there still, like the old woman who
lived on the hill," broke in Nancy.
The others laughed. It did not seem unkind somehow to make a little
innocent fun of the poor, dead, imaginary hermit who lived such an
uncomfortable life for his lost love.
"If you don't think it's highway robbery," observed Billie, "bring it
along. Having walked off with two boards, why pause at boxes?"
"A deserted box under a deserted house in a deserted wood should belong
to the first person who found it," said Elinor with conviction.
The box, which turned out to be an old cigar box with the lid tacked on,
was accordingly placed on top of the board with the hatchet, and once
more the procession started on its way.
"We look like a lot of pall bearers at a funeral," said Nancy
breathlessly as they trudged along.
At last they reached the Comet. It seemed an age since they had left him
wallowing in the sand, and his one great eye, which at night glared so
gloriously, now looked at them with mild reproach.
"The first thing to do is to find a log," said Edward, proceeding to
look for one.
The girls were surprised at his sudden energy when he appeared presently
dragging a fallen pine tree after him. Having got it across the road, he
chopped it to a proper length. The two boards he placed under the hind
wheels of the motor car, the ends being slightly raised by the pine
crossbeam.
"We'll have to run the car backwards," he said, "because, of course, if
we try to go on, we'll have to turn around eventually."
Billie had cranked up and was already sitting in the chauffeur's seat.
She was beginning to see the usefulness of Edward's plan now. Once more
the Comet struggled and groaned in his effort to climb out of the sand
pit, but without moving an inch.
"It'll have to be the front wheels or nothing," said Edward, wiping the
perspiration from his brow as he carried the two boards and the
crossbeam to the front and placed them under the car.
This time, with a mighty strain, the Comet rolled slowly onto the
boards, went the full length and promptly sank again into the sand. But
each time he responded promptly to the "board treatment," as Billie
called it, and after infinite patience and energy they finally pulled
him to harder ground.
"What shall we do now?" asked Nancy. "We're only getting deeper into the
woods."
"We can't turn around," answered Billie. "We'll just have to ride over
bush and brake, I suppose, and follow the path."
"Sound the horn, then," said Elinor, "to scare away the animals," and as
the honk, honk rang out in the stillness the birds and beasts who lived
in the woods must have thought some terrible new creature had come to
disturb their haunts.
It was a slow ride they took that morning along the trail. The Comet
picked his way cautiously, crushing vegetation under his iron wheels,
like the car of Juggernaut riding over its victims, while the Motor
Maids and Edward Paxton ducked their heads frequently to avoid being hit
with vines and branches.
Past the hermit's house they went, past the enclosure and still the path
persevered. They could trace it far in front of them. The trail had been
carefully and deliberately made, evidently. Trees had been felled on
each side and vines and plants torn away, and although a new vegetation
had grown up, the path was still open.
Except for the noise made by the wheels of the motor car as it passed
over bracken and fern and all the varied undergrowth of a great forest,
there was not a sound. The woods were deadly quiet. The birds had
stopped singing; even, the insects ceased to buzz. The quiet was
terrible.
"I feel," whispered Mary, "as if everything in the place was waiting for
something to happen. Do you notice there isn't a sound? The birds are
too frightened to sing. I have heard that a poisonous snake could
hypnotize a whole forest like this."
No one replied to this unpleasant suggestion. There was a long, uneasy
silence. Then, suddenly, the Comet gave a swift backward movement like a
terrified horse. Right in his path crouched a creature which might, in
that shady twilight spot, have been taken for a good-sized cat. But his
body was spotted, each spot outlined with an uneven circle of black, and
his tawny eyes gleamed more fiercely than any cat's eyes ever gleamed.
"It's a leopard!" whispered Billie, as she backed the Comet slowly along
the path.